


And My Heart Stuttered To A Stop

by Publius (Phin_Adison)



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Aaron Is a Good Bro, Alex has issues, Child Abuse, Childhood Trauma, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Speech Disorders, Stuttering, Trauma
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-10
Updated: 2018-11-10
Packaged: 2019-08-21 15:54:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,744
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16579595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Phin_Adison/pseuds/Publius
Summary: Work very much in progress.James Hamilton was an asshole. In some other world, he might have not even been above just packing his things and leaving his child and its mother to fend for themselves. As it was, he stayed, but that didn't suddenly turn him into a good man. He was short tempered, a drunk, and could occasionally be quite cruel.When his son gets older, and turned out to be sometimes a little too smart, a little too loud for his own good, he dealt with it as he saw fit.And left scars that don't heal as quickly as the bruises he inflicted on his son.!Warning! for child abuse, childhood trauma and mental health issues. If any of this could be a trigger to you, please continue with caution. Talk to someone if you need help!





	And My Heart Stuttered To A Stop

**Author's Note:**

> I had this scenario running around in my head; "What if speaming wasn't Alex's strongest weapon, but rather his biggest weakness?" 
> 
> English is not my native language and this is my first story, so any criticism is welcome! If anyone would maybe even like to be a regular beta for this story, let me know :)

**_How does a bastard, orphan,_ **

**_son of a whore and a Scotsman,_ **

**_dropped in the middle of a forgotten_ **

**_Spot in the Caribbean by Providence, impoverished, in squalor_ **

**_Grow up to be a hero and a scholar?_ **

 

When he had nothing but is words and voice

And someone took away his choice

Tried to keep him from speaking his mind

They can’t make him stupid, and deaf and blind

Could never keep his bravery and brains

His visionary attitude, his heart in chains.

 

How could his story have turned anything but south?

If his words were not able to just sprout from his mouth

And his genius would not easily get him the fame

He deserved, yo man, what _is_ your name?

“… A-a-alex… Alexa-ander Ha-amilton”

꙳꙳꙳꙳꙳

Some people might have said, Alexander was very lucky. Pretty much the whole town knew that, when Alex was about 10 years old, his father thought about leaving his family. Eventually, James decided against it when he found a job. And a young prostitute girl, half his current whore’s age, that was infatuated with him and thought he would marry her eventually if she just kept sleeping with him for free.

His life had turned around, but one thing that really bothered him was his bastard son. He was an honorable Scotsman after all (at least by his own standards), so he could not leave the small smart mouth without aiding him and his mother financially. It would be frowned upon, he might lose his job again and how would he then be able to buy the rum that drew him to settle in the Caribbean region in the first place?

The little bastard, who looked so much like his damn mother, all black hair and eyes and smooth brow skin, and thought he was oh-so smart. So what if the little tike was a bit clever? Doesn’t mean he shouldn’t keep his mouth shut every once in a while.

And James would help out in that department if the boy couldn’t do it on his own, as was his right and duty as father after all.

_Whack_

Alexander flinched as he was struck right across his face. His mother didn’t know what to do; she could barely stand to watch as her son was slapped again and again, but at the same time she couldn’t seem to tear her gaze away either. It was almost with a morbid sense of fascination that she watched another palm-sized print pattern the boys dark-skinned cheek, matching the ones she could often find on her own body.

The man who fathered her child, who used to be so charming in their youth, has grown bitter and cruel. Yet she couldn’t bring herself to leave him either, couldn’t rob her beloved son of his father, never mind of the food he could put on their table for them. As little as it may be, it was better than nothing.

“Do you still have a comment to make, boy?”

He didn’t shout, he almost never did. He was a man of few words. But he could line what little he spoke with a coldness that would make you want to cower away from them either way.

Little Alexander trembled, shaking his head and trying to suppress the tears that sprang to his eyes as his cheek continued to sting.

He would hold it all in. For now. He knew that, as soon as the sun starts dipping into the ocean, his father would be gone, to lose his mind either at the bottom of a bottle or under a girl’s skirt. Then, and only then, would Alex crawl into his mother’s lap. He would be able to forget for a second as she combs her fingers through his hair and listen to her smooth voice sing to him until he can hardly keep his eyes open.

She doesn’t ask him if he’s alright, doesn’t have to. She doesn’t look for excuses, doesn’t tell him it will all soon be better.

Not anymore.

꙳꙳꙳꙳꙳

Alex had missed his twelfth birthday. He was too far gone, succumbed to the fever his illness brought along. All he remembered was that his mother had held him close, had rocked him back and forth after he had been sick into the bucket next to his cot. He doesn’t remember that he had started talking in his delirium.

“Is this what dying feels like?”

His mother had never been so scared in her live. She held him as close as she could, not daring to let go of him for even a second as thought he might disappear if she did. She just kept shushing him, stroking his hair as she had done so often. She did so until she herself got ill.

She did so until she fell asleep one night, never to wake up again.

Alex wondered for a long time why he couldn’t have died in her arms that night. To remember nothing but the warmth of her bosom and the weight of her hand in his hair.

Now, there was no one left that actually cared about him. No one to safe him from his father’s wrath, to tell him that he was good and smart and brave.

All he had left was his father. The man who laid a heavy hand on his shoulder at his mother’s funeral, forcing him to keep his tears and sorrow silent.

꙳꙳꙳꙳꙳

James Hamilton married the younger prostitute, saying he actually loved her, something he never managed where the Alex’s late mother was concerned. The boy thought the reason to rather be that the girl had become pregnant and her father would probably kill James if his grandson was born a bastard. Bad enough that he entered the marriage with “baggage” as they had taken to referencing to Alexander as.

Alex grew very quiet after that. Talking had never brought him anything but pain and suffering, after all.

He went on with life, eventually. Learned to “finally make himself useful”. Most townsmen thought he was a bit stupid; they knew he never talked and guessed that maybe that was because he didn’t have much to say. Their old landlord knew better than that though, had known the child when he was still brighter than the sun at its highest point, just like his mother. He let Alex work for him. There wasn’t a lot of money in their trade, but it kept money in his pockets, kept him out of the house of an abusive father and a step mother that despised him for being another woman’s child.

꙳꙳꙳꙳꙳

He had already longed for death once, so there wasn’t too much fight in him when the hurricane hit their island. They saw the clouds hours before they felt the winds, saw the sky turn sickly yellow. The old landlord send Alex home after they spend the morning tying everything they could together. They didn’t know how much use it would be, the storm could turn every moment after all. He found is father’s door locked though, windows drawn shut. There would be no shelter for him here, but it wasn’t as if there was ever. Numb and resigned to his fate, Alexander went to the small, overgrown cemetery. He sat next to the plain stone that marked his mother’s grave and awaited his fate.

When the water came, it came fast. Merciless.

And when they finally swept him up, he again didn’t remember much. Like the first time he should have died though, he was as close to his mother as he could.

And, much like the first time, he didn’t.

He awoke on the floor of the small church. The old building had lost most of its roof in the storm but was far enough uphill to be mostly safe from rushing waters. When the waves had receded back into the ocean, scouts had discovered Alexander’s body, broken and bruised, by a gathering of trees that nature’s forces had pushed him up against. They were most surprised to have found him alive at all, they told him. They had thought him lost when they had seen that his father’s house at the shore had been almost completely washed off into the sea.

An old woman told him it was a miracle. To Alex, it felt more like a curse.

꙳꙳꙳꙳꙳

Alex never talked unless prompted, everyone knew that, which was why most people where so surprised when they found out how gifted with words he was. Since he was old enough to properly hold a quill, Alex had written letters for other people, for a small fee, of course. Sometimes, when she was still alive, he had written letters to his mother. She had loved them, and it used to be his greatest joy to put that small, proud smile on her lips.

This was the first time in a very long time he would make use of his talent, as he wrote on every scrap of paper he could find, getting his slender fingers stained with ink. He wrote about the effects of the storm. About futures washed away and families torn apart by tragedy, about the hunger and the tears and the blood.

And he wrote about the brave souls, the strong men and women who shared what little they had, who gave shelter to those who had none and cared for everyone who had fallen ill.

He wrote all this down, pages upon pages of stories. As he wrote the words down, they sank into his very core, and he knew he would never forget the faces of the people that came to his cot to talk to him while he was still too week to move around and help. Every time they cried ad laughed, they handed him a piece of their heart as if to ask him to keep it safe. And so he did, in the only way he knew.

Alexander was fast asleep at night when a man, a fellow townsman whom he barely knew in passing, took note of his pages and started to read. He was so moved by the teens words that he gathered some of his friends around and read it to them.

The story spread around, about the silent boy whose words could move mountains.

 

**_They passed a plate around_ **

**_Total strangers_ **

**_Moved to kindness […]_ **

**_Raised enough for [him] to book passage on a ship that was New York bound…_ **


End file.
